


Ullastret

by SirJosephBanksFRS



Category: Aubrey-Maturin Series - Patrick O'Brian
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-08
Updated: 2013-08-08
Packaged: 2017-12-22 18:50:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SirJosephBanksFRS/pseuds/SirJosephBanksFRS
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stephen Maturin is brought to the home of his godfather from Ireland.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ullastret

The horse stopped and the grooms stepped forward to take the reins. Ramon leaned forward and put his arms around Stephen, lifting him from the saddle where a groom took him from his arms and placed him on the ground and Ramon dismounted. The horse was led away. Stephen looked up at him and Ramon embraced him, though the child barely came up to his waist. He was small for a five and a half year old boy, though his face appeared wise beyond his years, his pale blue eyes looking almost silver or white in the right conditions, the irises rimmed dark blue, his countenance ever serious, almost grave.

“Well, we have arrived, Estevet.” Ramon said kindly. Ramon smelled reassuringly of tobacco, leather and horse and Stephen clung to him. It was very late in the afternoon, almost the early evening and it was starting to get dark in Ullastret. They were surrounded by servants and Ramon was leading him into the massive building, as big as a church, Stephen thought, the church he had seen in Dublin on the way to the ship. They were now walking inside and the sounds echoed off the stone walls, just like in a church. There were so many people, Stephen could not focus on all of them. A child’s voice piped between their persons.

“ _Pare_ , are you here?”

 “Laetitia, come and see what I have brought you!” Ramon called. Stephen translated into Irish slowly. He had been fetched by a servant of Ramon and had received a baptism in Catalan, for the man spoke nothing else and it had taken over a month to get to Barcelona. He wondered what a Laetitia was and suddenly, a girl was standing before him.

Bridie Coolan had told him of princesses and he thought she must be a princess. Stephen was no judge of age -- she was clearly somewhat older than he was, but a child still. She was, quite simply, the most beautiful being he had ever seen. She was tall, slender and had a regal carriage, her every movement embodying grace and elegance, not like any girl Stephen had ever known. She had long, raven hair that curled in loose ringlets, flawless alabaster skin, strong yet fine features that were as perfect as the china doll he had seen in a window in Dublin on the way to the ship. Her very large, clear eyes appeared violet in the darkness of the hall but were, in fact, dark sapphire blue. She was clad in lupine blue silk and had a string of pearls around her slender neck from which dangled a gold cross at the center of her throat.

“ _Papa_ , have you brought me a holy relic? " Ramon laughed.

“No, my love, I brought you your cousin.” The girl looked at Stephen with an expression of great displeasure and started to cry.

“Take him back! I don’t want him!” She said, and she struck Ramon on the thigh and ran off weeping, her silk slippers noiselessly skimming the stones of the floor as she ran away. Ramon laughed.

“Well, then, come _Padrecito_.” Ramon said and took Stephen’s hand and led him in.

It was weeks later when it had all filtered into Stephen’s consciousness, when he was now never surprised to be addressed as “Esteven,” when he had a better idea exactly who Ramon d'Ullastret i Casademon was and why Stephen was there in Ullastret. He would be staying here for a few months and then be sent to see his grandmother in Lleida and then back to his uncle in Barcelona, the brother of his mother, to begin his formal schooling. Ramon was his _Padrí_ , his godfather and a cousin of his mother. He had sent for Stephen from Ireland, he was the kindest man Stephen had ever met and Laetitia was his only child. She was two years older than Stephen and from what Stephen could see, she was what Bridie had described but he had never actually seen -- a very “spoiled” child. It was not hard to see why. Ramon adored her. Her mother was in poor health. He lavished gifts and affection on the child and she merely had to cough to get him to leap up and ask her if she were well, as her mother was consumptive and not long for this world.

 

Laetitia did not care for her cousin, Esteven and made that fact abundantly clear when there were no adults around. If there were adults, she held her tongue. Within three weeks, she had explained to him exactly the meaning of the word “bastard” and why it was the proper descriptive for him and all the implications that his status would have for him. She kept looking into his face to see his reaction and he had simply looked at her gravely, which had seemed to displease her, so she then told him his mother and father were dead and that he was an orphan. He looked at her with a degree of detachment that seemed to unnerve her, so she tired of the game and left him.

 

Two weeks after arriving, Stephen had been dressed in finery that Ramon had ordered made for him for that Sunday to go to Mass down in the village church in La Bisbal d'Emporda, Santa Maria de la Bisbal. They left the palace-castle in Ullastret and walked the two miles to Mass. The Mass was much longer than Stephen had ever experienced. He felt nature’s call and slipped silently outside to relieve himself behind a tree and found Laetitia alone, sitting in the shade against the wall of the church. She had a very small frog in her hand and was holding the pin of her brooch and was poking the frog in the limbs with it as it squirmed in her hand, trying to escape. She was even more beautiful than he had ever seen her, in her very best Sunday clothes, her hair hanging in glossy jet ringlets down her back and her eyes sparkled like the jewels she wore around her neck, like the facets of the jewel of the brooch she had unpinned from her shawl.

“God’s grace to you, Cousin,” Stephen said. “”What art thou doing?” He got down on his haunches to look.

She was experimenting with the frog, she told him, and he had better go back into Mass and leave her alone or she would tell her _Pare_ that he was being horrid to her on the Holy Sabbath, that he had slapped and pinched her and made her weep. She was capable of shedding tears instantly, so he believed her. He stood up.

“Pray be kind to Brother Frog.” Stephen said. She looked at him scornfully and took the pin from the brooch and pressed it through the top of the head of the frog, pithing it and then threw the spasmodically twitching frog into the middle of the street. Stephen felt the bile rise in his throat. He turned and rushed back towards the door of the church and vomited in the large bush by the door.

He walked home with Ramon after Mass. Laetitia had been sent home in a coach because she had complained that her slippers pinched and her feet hurt. Stephen had danced the _Sardana_ for the first time and had loved it, had loved the music and learning the steps, holding Ramon’s hand. Ramon held his hand and swung his arm back and forth as they walked.

"I do not sit well with Laetitia." Stephen said.

"Little man, she is just jealous that you are a boy." Ramon said. "Do not permit her to upset you. She will come to love you as she should, in time.”

 

Stephen was staying with Ramon the week before he was to leave for Ireland to study at Trinity in Dublin. He was fifteen, about to turn sixteen in the next three months. Laetitia was seventeen, tall and beautiful, imperious and contemptuous of him. He had scarcely seen her in the last year. She had just answered him rudely yet again when her father took her by the elbow and pulled her out of the room into the large pantry off the dining hall. Stephen sat in the chair, not knowing what to do, clutching his volume of Livy. He could hear their voices and wondered if he should leave for his room.

“Why can you not be sweet with Esteven? He’s leaving tomorrow for Ireland and who knows when you will see him again. He is always so very kind to you, Laetitia.” An inaudible reply. “Be nice to Esteve and maybe he will marry you when he is twenty-one.” Ramon said. “He is a fine young man. I have never known one that was finer.”

“I would not marry that repulsive little toad if he were the last male on the face of the earth.” Laetitia spat. Stephen heard a noise that sounded like a slap, a gasp and scream and then Laetitia was weeping .

Ramon was speaking to her in a low growl, so low that the words were not discernible until he heard, “...everything. And I mean everything, _la meva dama bella._ Every last _reale_ , every _céntimo_. You shall be no _pubilla_. Consider that fact with the next _cavaller_ who comes to woo you.”

 

Stephen took his book and the candle to his bedchamber. He fell asleep within an hour, barely able to blow out the candle as he closed _Ab Urbe Condita._

He woke up with a start. He was not alone. He could smell _eau de lavand ambre_. Laetitia was in the bed with him in the pitch darkness. He could see absolutely nothing, as it was the new moon.

 _“Laetitia, què estàs fent aquí?”_ He said, barely able to open his eyes he was so tired.

 _“Només calla-te.”_ He moved his hand and realised she was disrobed entirely. She was pulling at his nightshirt.

“You should go back to your bed.” He whispered.

“You say one more word and I will scream and tell _Pare_ that you forced me to come here like this.” She said through gritted teeth.

“Why?” He said, as her hand slipped up and under his nighshirt.

“Say you love me.”

“I do love you.” Stephen said.

“Say it.” She hissed.

“I love you, Laeti. I have always loved you.”

“You want this, don’t you? Admit it. Admit it now.” He said nothing. “Your _verga_ says you do.” He was still silent, feeling his face turn bright red. He bit his lip and then she was on top of him and he gasped as he realised that he had penetrated her.

“Say you love me.”

“I love you.” He whispered. It was, unfortunately, true.

“Say you want this.”

“I do.” He said, with a mixture of desire and shame. His heart was beating fast.

“Say again that you love me.”

“I love you.”

“Well, I utterly loathe you.” She said and she leaned forward and was kissing him, her tongue swimming in his mouth. She sat up and stroked his belly and laughed as his hips convulsively moved to thrust. She moved back and forth a handful of times and it was over for him. She gasped and struck his face with her open hand.

“Idiot! What did you do that for? Holy Mother of God!” She said and jumped up. The room was so dark that he could barely make out the whiteness of her bare skin. She grabbed her silk dressing gown and put it on. “If you ever say anything to anyone, I will tell _Papa_ that you raped me and if he does not outright kill you, he will never speak to you again.” Laetitia said and she left the room as silently as she came.

 

The next morning, Laetitia did not appear at breakfast. Stephen was up very early and met Ramon at table. Ramon was always an early riser.

“ _Padrí_ , I must go to Mass before I leave for Barcelona. If I hurry, I can make it to the one that starts at half past seven.” Stephen said. Ramon smiled at him

“May God bless you and keep you, Esteve, _el meu fill._ You are not leaving to go to Dublin to become a priest. You were just at Mass yesterday. Your soul is clean. You are a man today. You go out in the world on your own.” Ramon embraced him around the shoulders and patted him.

“I must.” Stephen repeated.

“Well, if you must, then you must.” Ramon said, smiling. “I will walk down with you. We have plenty of time.”

 

Stephen sat in the confessional and the priest came in. They went through the formulaic Latin rite of penance.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned, it has been one day since my last confession. I have committed a sin against chastity, Father.”

“By yourself or with others?”

“With others, Father.”

“How did this happen?” Stephen was silent for a very long time.

“A young lady -- she came into my room, Father, whilst I slept.” There was a long silence. “I was not chaste, Father. I have committed the act. I had no intention, but I did not resist.”

“Why did you not call out? Was there no one else there?”

“I could not.”

“Why?” Stephen was silent. “Tell me my son. The weight will pass from your shoulders to mine.”

“She said she would call her father and tell him that I had violated her, Father. She came naked to my bed. She has the deepest antipathy for me, Father. She always has. I do not understand. She has always detested and reviled me. She asked me to say I loved her and I did so and then she...” He broke off. “She consummated the act, Father. I know I sinned. I should have called out for her father. She consummated the act and told me to say again that I loved her and I did so and she said, “I utterly loathe you.”” The priest was silent. Stephen bowed his head. “For these and all the sins of my past life, I ask pardon of God, penance, and absolution from you, Father.” He said in Latin, trying to keep his voice from breaking. The priest, who had known Stephen since his first Mass ten years before in Santa Maria de la Bisbal sighed. He could presume who “she” and “her father” were.

“It is not your sin, my son. Lighten your heart.”

“But I enjoyed it, Father, may God forgive me.” Stephen said, his head bowed. He was deeply ashamed.

“St. Augustine enjoyed the sin, my son. So God made us. We do not have to achieve perfection, merely to strive for it and to ask forgiveness when we go astray, in every single instance. Do not ever let the fact that you enjoy the commission of a sin ever be a barrier to seeking forgiveness. God would not put such a burden on you. Say a good Act of Contrition. There is no penance for you. You leave today, do you not?”

“Yes, Father. In a matter of hours, with the blessing.”

“Go with God, Esteven. Say an Act of Contrition now with me and go with God, my son.”

 

Stephen had been in Dublin at Trinity for four months when he received a letter from his _Padrí_. Laetitia had died a month after he had left. She had tripped -- her slipper had caught the hem of her gown on the stone staircase in Ullastret and she had fallen. Her neck had broken in the fall, she had died almost instantly, the doctor had told him. She had never regained consciousness “Dearest Esteven, pray say a novena for her, _el meu Fill._ Life is short and God’s ways are too mysterious to be known by man. I pray that you go with God ever, my dearest son and many prayers for the success of your studies. I long to see you again in Barcelona but may God go with you every step of the way, until we meet again.”

Stephen sat looking at the letter. Ramon had confided one night as they sat before a fire outdoors that he had contracted the mumps late in life for the first time when Laetitia had them as a baby. He would never have another child. “But I have you and Laeti and I promised your mother and father that you would always be a son to me and so you are.” Ramon said. “You will always have a home in Ullastret, Esteven."


End file.
